Peter Wolf
Appearances
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Well, I'll tell you, I was coming down from Boston, and all of a sudden, my phone started lighting up like Times Square. And all of a sudden, I found the news. So it's too soon for me to even feel anything.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Let it in, Peter.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Let the poor come down. But, you know, I'm the kind of guy that, you know, comedy depresses me. So, you know, if it's half empty, well, not you. Thank you.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
But if it's half-empty or half-full, I go to the half-empty side. So it still hasn't kind of sunk in.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
This was unplanned. Jordan does not know about this. But I did some research on him, and he comes from Kalamazoo. That's right. So I got you some special bourbon from Kalamazoo.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Well, maybe we'll talk for a little bit, and then we'll have a little shower.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And now I find out, I don't know if I should be saying this, but I got to meet your dad in the dressing room.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Where is he? Where is he?
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
I was telling your dad that Full House was my favorite Jay Giles record. Yeah. And, you know, you like all of them, but that one happens to be my favorite because it just was like a snapshot of what we did.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Like a decisive moment. And we just started at, you know, 99 miles an hour and just kept going. Yeah. And your dad was there. It was in a place called the Cinderella Ballroom. And the place was so funky that about six months after we played it, they just tore it down. It's still an empty lot. You literally brought down the house. We brought down the house.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Well, Jordan, during the pandemic, everybody was, friends of mine were writing rock operas, symphonies, doing this and doing that. I just sat and I watched old movies in red. And then a lot of musicians started putting out memoirs. And a lot of them were just, you know, a cookie cutter kind of thing. And unless you were really into the musician, they were kind of boring.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And not all of them, but... Many of them. And so I decided, I was thinking for 10 years of writing a book, and there was a friend of mine, a steam writer, Peter Gernick, that wrote some great books on music, the best books on Elvis that had ever been written.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And he said to me, Peter, if you're going to write the book, you better start now, because the people you're going to want to read are going to be dead. And so there are a lot of notable names in this book, but it's really, I didn't want it to be about me. I wanted it to be about the people that I idolized.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And people like Aretha Franklin, who I got to work with, and people like Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker. And a lot of the book, yeah. Yeah, that's right. We got a John Lee Hooker fan here. And Van Morrison and all these people that I was honored, you know, to get to meet. And so when I read some of these other books, they would describe, oh, we ran into so-and-so.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
But they didn't really tell you what so-and-so was about. So I tried to, you know, bring out the experiences that I had with these artists. And not all artists. Some people are not well-known. But people that I thought were just great characters and who really influenced my life.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
It was. I mean, Granite Village was like a small left bank. There was no neon signs. You had it all filled with painters, lots of bohemian people. And, of course, there was the folk music and a lot of great jazz. There was great jazz clubs. So you had people like Charlie Mingus and, you know, Thelonious Monk playing in little clubs, and you can see them almost every night.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And then there were the folk singers. I was 16 years old, and I was in this store going through some records. It was a very famous store called the Folklore Center, where all the folk musicians hung out. and I'm hearing behind the curtain this voice. Yeah, piggy, piggy, oh, oh, I love my little piggy, oh.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Uh, no. We need some more. And so I got mesmerized by this voice. I couldn't see who it was. It was behind the curtain. Didn't know if it was, you know. And all of a sudden, this fella comes out with these two other people walking out with guitars, and I go up to the owner of the shop, and I said, who was that guy? And from that point on, I became mesmerized with... person who became Bob Dylan.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And I tried to find out everywhere he played. I was 16 years old. And Bob had just come into New York City. I think it was his second week in New York City. And so I got to really see him as he, you know, first became Bob Dylan. And he used to go and hang out at this place called Gertie's Folk City. And every Monday, they would have a hootenanny. And you paid a dollar to get in.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And you had to be 18. The drinking age was 18. I was 16. So I would always go with someone as tall and handsome as yourself.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Very smart move. Very smart move. And so we'd get in. And I'd always rush to the bar where Bob would be every Monday. And he'd be sitting at the bar. And I remember he'd be sitting at the bar. I'd be over here. And he'd be talking to some guy. You know, I just heard this guy Robert Johnson. Man, I could tell you, man, this guy was something else. He has truth in Robert Johnson.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And I could tell truth in people. And he's talking. And he had a glass of, you know, wine next to him. And so I'd be sitting next to him. And Bob would be talking. And he'd turn around and go, oh, hey, Joe, another little glass here. Guy was talking about it. Bob would take a little sip. He'd put it down. I'd go, woo. I was 16. I couldn't get anything. So he'd keep going.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
I would drink all Bob Dylan's, you know, wine. You would take it? Yeah. You'd get the Bob Dylan juice. So I stayed a fan all the way through the years. And I'm still a fan. Because he's still going. He's still doing it. And it's unique. And just getting to know him. And there's a story in that book where I was drinking.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
To get really loaded back then, I would drink these things called Rum 51, Bacardi 151. It had 151% alcohol. So the whole idea was don't eat, drink two of those down really quick, and you get smoshed. I was going to say, I think that would burn your insides out. And so I'm staggering down 6th or 7th Avenue. There's old Henry's Steakhouse.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And there I see my idol, Bob Dylan, sitting there all alone reading the New York Times. And he sees me coming, and he pulls the Times over his face. It's too late, and I walk over to the table, and I sit down, and I say to him, which everyone says to a celebrity, excuse me, sir, I don't mean to bother you, but... And then they proceed to do everything they said they're not going to do.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Well, in the book, one of my favorite chapters is my interaction with Bob, and I'll just leave it at that.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
Well, you know, I saw Muddy Waters first on an album cover. And I was intrigued by this album cover, Best of Muddy Waters. And I would just play it over and over. And then I finally realized he was playing at this small club, Club 47, where Bob Dylan, Joan Baez got her start. And so I would hang out. He was playing one afternoon.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
I got there at like 2 o'clock in the afternoon and just waited and waited. And finally, these two black Cadillacs came coming up to the club. And there he was, my idol, beautiful, handsome, noble, regal, out stepped Muddy Waters. And I ran up to him and said, Mr. Waters, welcome to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Is there anything I can do for you?
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
yeah you can carry that equipment and he thought i worked in the club yeah and so i was in the club and it was a coffee shop and in the i was in the bathroom and in the loo and two of muddy's band members the great uh james cotton notice band they were in the saying this is a coffee shop and one of them said the other one yeah so what he said they just serve coffee because
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
They don't serve booze?" I said, no, man, it's just coffee. He said, what kind of club is this? So I come out of the stool and say, I'll get you some booze. And I did. And that started the friendship. And I had an apartment two blocks away. what eventually happened was the dressing room was the size of this cup. And so Muddy and the entire band ended up at my apartment for over two weeks.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And I got to, like, sit there. And there was Muddy Waters lying down in the futon, you know, had his, you know, T-shirt on. What's the word would you call it? Tank top. Tank top. tank top, lying on the bed, and he would tell me stories of how he first saw or heard Robert Johnson. Everyone was all talking about different things. James Cotton was cooking up all this down home.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And I just drew it all in. And I tried to describe how great these men were and also how their lives were, where they just went from city to city. They didn't have really much money. They just lived from dollar to dollar. They were legendary, and they supplied our, you know, musicians like me with so much. So I try to repay it by recapturing them in the story. And there's...
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
If I might tell one tale, that the John Lee Hooker, who became a favorite of mine, they're all our favorites, but John Lee in particular, because John Lee traveled alone. He didn't have a band. And he had these wraparound sunglasses. He was not too tall. He had a terrible stutter when he was offstage. When he was onstage, he never stuttered.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And I got to meet with him and then went to his first appearance. And like Muddy, very few people came at that time. And so I convinced him to let my band, which was called, this was the 60s, The Hallucinations. Sure. But we were all art students and all hallucinators. Sure. So I convinced John Lee Hooker to let us open up for him.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
And then I asked, you know, Mr. Hooker, would you mind if I came by the hotel and hung out with you? Notice the guy had wraparound sunglasses, you know, the cap. He sang songs like, well, you know, these great blues songs. And he said, yeah, come by Lenox Hotel, 4 o'clock, room 302. Oh, man, it was like Christmastime. I was standing by that door at 3 o'clock. 4 o'clock, I knocked on the door.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
I heard a voice. Come on in. And I walked in. The door was open. I opened up the door, and it was really dark, except for a TV screen. And there on the bed was the great John Lee Hooker, with these Argyle socks, you know, all the way, you know, all the way up to there. And he had on, you know, tank top, do-rag on his head, wrap-around sunglasses.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
On the night table was a bottle of Ballantyne Scotch. There was cool cigarettes all up in the ashtray. And there was, you know, this, you know, cools. And then on the other bed, she was just beautiful, curved. I mean, beautifully laid out on the bed, all across the bed. was his 335 guitar. Sure. Yeah. And there was the blue man, and he said, come on in. Room was dark. TV was on.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
I pulled up the chair. He said, sit on down. And I'm sitting down, you know, waiting for a conversation. I'm realizing that John Lee's right riveted. in the TV screen. So I look over at the TV screen, and this is the man that sang, I'm mad. I'm bad. I can cut you. I can beat you. I could stab you. I could kill you. I'm mad. I'm bad like Jesse James.
The Daily Show: Ears Edition
GOP Shills for Tesla, Trump Admin Flubs JFK File Release & DEI Scrubbing | Peter Wolf
This man with the wraparound sunglasses watching TV, and I realize John Lee Hooker is watching Lassie. And when he realizes, I realize, in his inimitable ways, he says, Peter, let me tell you, that Lassie, he's one motherfucking smart dog.